Kings of the Hill. Teams that managed to become first on HLTV
The HLTV rating takes into account many factors and for high positions it is not enough to win one or two major tournaments, and not every event has much weight. Sometimes even winning a major cannot guarantee first place in the HLTV team rating. In the entire history of Counter-Strike, there have been only a few teams that were able to climb high enough to take the first line. But this is not the limit: the maximum achievement is 1000 rating points. And it is about the teams that were able to achieve this indicator that we will talk about in this material.
The Counter-Strike 2 Era
Almost a year has passed since the release of Counter-Strike 2, but during this time only three teams have managed to reach the top of the HLTV rating. Just the other day, this achievement was awarded to the new Natus Vincere roster, whose victory at PGL Major Copenhagen 2024 was considered an accident by everyone, but even months later, the team continues to progress and reach new heights. This is not the first time that Natus Vincere has earned 1000 points in the HLTV rating, the organization’s gold roster managed to do this in the summer of 2021, and then they managed to maintain this value until the roster change in the spring of 2022.
Previously, MOUZ had 1000 points in the HLTV rating. This figure was achieved in May 2024 after a successful start of the first competitive season this year. This is an amazing result, because the team almost entirely consists of academy graduates and its players did not have much experience on the professional stage before. The team often makes mistakes in games on the big stage due to pressure and stress, but their results still deserve respect.
A few days before MOUZ’s ascent to the top, FaZe Clan had their 1000 points. The team dominated after the release of Counter-Strike 2 and held the first place in the rating for a long time, but they only managed to reach their maximum value in the rating in April 2024. In November, before the departure of Russell Twistzz van Dulken, the team also managed to score 1000 points in the HLTV rating. But even this was not the first time for FaZe Clan, the team dominated in CS:GO, they also had a record in the rating in September after winning IEM Cologne 2022 and in May 2022, when they won PGL Major Antwerp 2022.
The end of CS:GO and the Covid times
The last dominant team before the transition to Counter-Strike 2 was Team Vitality. A month before the release of the new version of the shooter, Vitality managed to win Gamers8 2023 and earn 1000 points, but a few months before that, the team became the champion of the last CS:GO major – BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023. So in May and June, Team Vitality also had the maximum number of points. As in the case of FaZe Clan, this was not the only time that Team Vitality was at the top – the previous team also managed this in 2020 after winning BLAST Premier Fall 2020 Finals and IEM Beijing-Haidian 2020 Europe.
Before that, G2 Esports had been at the top of the HLTV rankings for a couple of months, having managed to win IEM Katowice 2023 and BLAST Premier World Final 2022. At that time, no one considered Rasmus HooXi Nielsen a problem, because Justin jks Savage was on the roster and the team was doing well.
HEROIC also had a certain era of dominance in December 2022. This happened after second place at IEM Rio Major 2022 and victory at BLAST Premier Fall Final 2022. It lasted only 3 weeks, but it was still exactly one more than the previous leader, Outsiders (Virtus.pro). No one expected the team to win IEM Rio Major 2022, and apparently the team itself did not either, but it allowed them to take first place in the HLTV rankings and earn 1000 points.
Before these tournaments, the game had been online for a long time, like the rest of the world, due to the coronavirus pandemic and mass lockdown. This was a great opportunity for Gambit Esports to reach the top, as the team had always performed consistently well online and performed poorly on LAN. After victories at BLAST Premier Spring Final 2021, IEM Summer 2021 and EPIC League CIS 2021, the team was awarded 1000 points in the HLTV rating. They had managed to maintain this figure before, after second places at DreamHack Masters Spring 2021 and ESL Pro League Season 13.
"Golden Times" of CS:GO
Astralis also managed to catch the era of coronavirus and online after winning DreamHack Masters Winter 2020 Europe and IEM Global Challenge 2020, as well as second places at BLAST Premier Fall 2020 Finals and BLAST Premier Global Final 2020. But the team is remembered for much more than that. The team had the longest era in the history of Counter-Strike and won 4 majors. The team reached 1000 points in the HLTV rating several more times: at the end of 2019 after winning BLAST Pro Series Global Final 2019, ECS Season 8 Finals and IEM Beijing 2019, at the beginning of the same year after triumphs at BLAST Pro Series São Paulo 2019 and IEM Katowice 2019 and almost all of 2018 after BLAST Pro Series Lisbon 2018, ESL Pro League Season 8 Finals, ECS Season 6 Finals, IEM Chicago 2018, ELEAGUE CS:GO Premier 2018, ECS Season 5 Finals, ESL Pro League Season 7 Finals and DreamHack Masters Marseille 2018. But Astralis first achieved these heights back in 2017, winning IEM Katowice 2017, ELEAGUE Major 2017 and ECS Season 2 Finals.
Also unexpectedly, BIG looked at the top of the HLTV rating, the Germans had 1000 points after victories at DreamHack Open Summer 2020 Europe, cs_summit 6 Europe and DreamHack Masters Spring 2020 – Europe.
During the times of Astralis dominance, they were replaced for a while by Team Liquid, who also managed to win several major tournaments in 2019: IEM Chicago 2019, BLAST Pro Series Los Angeles 2019, ESL One Cologne 2019, ESL Pro League Season 9 Finals and DreamHack Masters Dallas 2019.
2016-2018 also became the time of dominance of the Brazilians from Luminosity/SK on the world stage. They managed to win ESL Pro League Season 6 Finals, BLAST Pro Series Copenhagen 2017, EPICENTER 2017, ESL One Cologne 2017, ECS Season 3 Finals, DreamHack Open Summer 2017, IEM Sydney 2017 and cs_summit Spring 2017, ESL One Cologne 2016, ESL Pro League Season 3 Finals, DreamHack Austin 2016 and MLG Columbus 2016.
It is worth remembering one of the first eras in the history of CS:GO – the era of the golden fnatic roster. It began exactly when the HLTV rating appeared. The Swedes had 1000 rating points from December 2015 to March 2016, and were able to win six tournaments in a row: IEM Katowice 2016, ESL Barcelona CS:GO Invitational, SL i-League StarSeries XIV Finals, ESL ESEA Pro League Season 2 Finals, Fragbite Masters Season 5 Finals and FACEIT League 2015 Stage 3 Finals.
Already in 2025, the HLTV rating is very likely to fade into the background or disappear altogether. All invitations to tournaments will be issued based on the personal rating of Valve developers, and all third-party team tops risk becoming irrelevant. But we will always remember the teams that managed to achieve great heights in the HLTV rating, because this result is the merit of long months of grueling training and constant official performances at major tournaments.
All teams that had 1000 points in the HLTV rating:
- Natus Vincere
- FaZe Clan
- MOUZ
- G2 Esports
- Team Vitality
- Astralis
- Team Liquid
- fnatic
- Luminosity/SK
- Outsiders (Virtus.pro)
- HEROIC
- Gambit
- BIG